


The Friend Zone

by hopefuleigh



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Crushes, Darcy Lewis Is a Good Bro, F/M, Friendzone, One-Sided Attraction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-11-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:47:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24990301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hopefuleigh/pseuds/hopefuleigh
Summary: Darcy’s dating history is akin to a trail of destruction with a cast of nefarious characters who all started out as verified Nice Guys, until they all inevitably turned out to be a few shades short of Super Villain. Don’t believe her? She’s got more than one police report to prove it.So, as much as she loves them, she swears off the Nice Guys. Relationships with Jerks are generally more trouble than they are worth, but Darcy just loves dating, okay?  And it would all be FINE, except she starts hanging out with a team of super heroes, which includes the quintessential Nice Guy, who she is dangerously attracted to, and who, if she is, in fact, an inadvertent maker of Super Villains, is someone she absolutely needs to keep in the Friend Zone.But have you seen that sheepish smile?  It SO hard, y’all.
Relationships: Darcy Lewis/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov
Comments: 83
Kudos: 301





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> I should not be writing this. I should be finishing my other two WIPs, including one that only had one chapter left to be done. But here we are.
> 
> I don’t know what this is, but it’s an idea that’s been creeping around in my brain for a bit. It’s going to be just stupid silliness with some contrived plotting. Enjoy!

Prologue

Darcy’s first boyfriend seems, by all accounts, like a good kid. Matthew shares her her taste in music, is an amazing laser tag opponent and often lets her win at MarioKart (but in a way that made it seem like he isn’t). He has freckles, plays soccer and she is always running into him while he is walking his family dog.

She kisses him at Susan McEntire’s 14th birthday party, and he takes her to the movies the next weekend. It seems like he’s the perfect high school boyfriend. They write notes to each other when they should be paying attention in class, hold hands as they walk down the hallways and share an array of inside jokes that could keep them giggling for hours. She feels like she is one of the lucky ones who falls in love with her best friend.

A best friend who, it turns out, has a taste for setting things on fire. Trash cans at first, but this grows to backyard sheds and the abandoned store on the corner by the gas station. He gets caught setting fire in the school’s photocopy room, and after the police take him away, Darcy never sees him again.

*

By the time Darcy starts college, she is beginning to think she is incapable of telling the nice guys apart from the creeps. She supposes this is likely true - just look at any of the fantastic men her mother parades in and out of her life, none of them could ever be objectively labelled a ‘nice guy’. Darcy is only a psych major for a few months, but she is able to see that she is perhaps repeating her mother’s patterns.

After all, there had been Mark, who was a shoplifter; John, who liked to pick fights with everyone, to the point where he’d practically caused a riot at the homecoming game; James, who bullied the kid in a wheelchair and then pushed Darcy into the lockers when she shouted at him over it; Peter, who was a serious drug dealer - like an actual drug dealer, with guns and everything - and who had stolen her car to pay back a loan; and, Kenneth, who had a bad habit of kidnapping neighbourhood animals so he could dissect them.

“Why don’t you try dating a nice guy for once?” Her roommate Stacey asks after listening wide-eyed to Darcy’s Dating Hall of Fame.

“Dude, you don’t think I’m trying? Everyone of them started off like perfectly nice guys, and then they morphed into fledgling super villains,” Darcy laughs bitterly.

“I’d introduce you to my brother, but it sounds like you’re cursed. Or maybe this is your super power. You can transform the nicest guy into a psychopathic serial killer with just one kiss,” Stacey cries before giggling and knocking back another shot of tequila.

“Yeah there is a chance you might be right about that. I’m definitely staying out of the dating game for awhile. You know, regroup and try it again with a clean slate,” Darcy says, even as she catches an attractive frat guy eyeing her from one table over. The voice in the back of her head is telling her to ignore it and just concentrate on having fun with her girls tonight. But, like an addict, she can’t resist. She glances over and smiles - her slow, sly half-smile that she knows most guys find irresistibly sexy.

*

Micah is a seemingly perfect guy. Only slight wiser than her high school self, Darcy makes herself wait a few weeks, giving herself enough time to really check him out. He is the head of his fraternity’s charity committee and runs an after-school program tutoring kids learning English as a second language. He wants to be a social worker, and spends hours telling her all about the injustices in the world he wants to make right, hypnotizing her with his passion. She debates changing her major.

He takes her to movies and football games, and he never makes a move. He insists that they are friends first, and until he wanted more, he was happy with that.

Darcy is completely in love with him. By the time she decides she wants to let him out of the Friend Zone, she has vetted him in every she could. There weren’t any skeletons lurking in his closet, no hidden dark side hiding under his perfect facade. She has finally found a nice guy.

So she kisses him one night, after he insists on walking her home from the bar, her courage fueled by too much vodka. He responds by taking her back to his room. When she wakes up the next morning in his bed, feeling warm and safe, if a tiny bit sore, she smiles smugly to herself. Darcy has not only broken her curse, the one she 100% didn’t believe existed but still lingered in the back of her mind ever since Stacey joked about it, but she has picked a pretty good guy to be her first.

It could have been a perfectly idyllic story, especially when Micah returns with two cups of coffee and a good morning kiss for her. But the sudden, insistent banging on the door makes her jump, splashing it on his bedspread.

She barely has time to pull her shirt on before the door is kicked and, and people are flooding his dorm room.

Turns out, Micah, in between his philanthropic activities, is a bit of a serial killer with a penchant for blonde freshman. Specifically, he likes to take his victims on a secret weekend getaway at his family’s country house, lock them in a trunk for three days before killing them and cutting their bodies into little pieces. Luckily for Darcy, she isn’t blonde. However, Darcy is dating a serial killer and five girls are dead.

Darcy decides, between bouts of hysterical sobbing and compulsive showering, a few things. First, she was transferring schools, needing to get as far away from anything Micah had touched. Unfortunately, getting away from her own skin is impossible, so transferring schools seems like the most practical option. And second, she definitely cursed. Or had some kind of strange villain-creating superpower. Every single boy she dates, kisses or sleeps with, based on her track record to date, transforms from a seemingly nice guy into something horrible. And it was escalating, each cash getting worse. So, third, Darcy promises, as much as she likes guys, as much as she loves flirting and dating and falling in love, that she is done. 

And while in the back of her mind, she is sure that this is an overreaction brought on by trauma and that she is not actually cursed or has the power to turn a nice guy into a serial killer, five girls are dead and she feels partly responsible. So she swears off dating.

*

She swears off dating for three full months, as she is consumed with moving to Culver, enrolling in classes and getting used to student life at a whole new university. 

But then the cute, nerdy guy from her work study job in the library smiles at her a certain way and the next thing she knows, she’s getting coffee with him, her love of flirting taking over. 

Thomas (not Tom) is pretentious, arrogant and vaguely misogynistic, and nothing like any of the guys she’s dated before. While he has his nice moments, makes her laugh and occasionally goes out of his way to do something to make her smile, for the most part, he’s a jerk. A jerk who often says rude things to her that sends her into a rage, resulting in a whirlwind cycle of fighting and making up.

When it finally ends with Thomas, it’s because she finds out he’s been sleeping with another girl when he accidentally texts Darcy instead of her. And while her pride is wounded and her heart is a bit sore from the breakup, after a few days of depression and crying, she is dazzled by the silver lining once she realizes it’s there.

She had dated someone, and it didn’t end with some horrible realization or discovery that the nice guy she was in love with was actually an arsonist, a drug dealer or a serial killer. In fact, she wasn’t even surprised that Thomas had cheated on her, because she knew all along he was a jerk. The only person to get hurt in this situation is Darcy.

So she revises her rules, scrapping the “no dating” clauses, and replacing it with “no dating nice guys.” After some trial and error and heartache, she finds the magic formula. In fact, her new best friend turns out to be a brilliant scientist who helps her collect the data to create her perfect formula (all while thinking Darcy is a bit nuts, but this is coming from a scientist who believes there are, like, rainbow bridges that allow interplanetary travel, so really, who is the crazy one here?) 

As long as the guy she is dating is at least 15% asshole, Darcy doesn’t have anything to worry about. Anyone nicer than that, and the risk is too great. With a jerky guy that is nice enough but not still, ultimately, a jerk, Darcy is sure she’s found the kryptonite for her weird, villain-creating super power. Darcy can date assholes, and no one gets hurt.

No one, that is, except Darcy.


	2. The Abraham Lincoln Phase

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy crushes on Abraham Lincoln and Steve Rogers in exactly the same kind of way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so this is totally AU. Don’t try to think too hard about where this falls in the MCU timeline. Bucky is around, Civil War wasn’t a thing, they live in the upstate compound...

“Hey Darcy,” Bucky says one morning, causing her to look up from her phone, interrupting her very determined efforts to keep her eyes anywhere other than on the man making them coffee in the kitchen. “Why don’t you like Steve?”

She is sprawled on the couch, wrapped up in a cozy blanket burrito, her eyes burning with last night’s makeup and the contacts she’d been too tired to take out last night when they stumbled in at 3AM, Darcy’s body slung over Bucky’s shoulder as she giggled with the effects of an extra glass of wine and far too much adrenaline. She’d passed out on the couch, Bucky on the floor beside her.

“Got nothing against Steve,” she answers as casually as she can. “What makes you say I don’t like him?”

Bucky shrugs, pulling himself up off the ground. Steve walks back into the room, carrying two steaming mugs, which he sets down on the coffee table before crossing his arms across his chest and frowning at them with disapproval.

“Uh oh,” Darcy says with a cheeky glance at Bucky.

“Do you two care to fill me in what happened last night?” he asks. His tone is chastising, but Darcy catches a hint of amusement on his face in the form of a half smile, and she quickly leans over to pick up a coffee cup to distract the butterflies from rioting in her stomach.

“Fight club,” Darcy says with a warning look at Bucky. “You promised.”

“I said I wouldn’t  _ volunteer  _ the details, not that I wouldn’t answer when asked,” Bucky responds with a shrug. “Don’t have anything to hide, I’m not the trouble maker.”

She sighs, a deep exaggerated sigh.

“Bucky felt compelled to defend my honour last night,” she says, meeting Steve’s eyes for the first time. His frown deepens, and she can see his jaw tighten.

“If you’d quit wasting your time flirting with every good for nothing that shows interest in you…” Bucky comments darkly.

“I thought I had the situation handled, but the guy wouldn’t leave it alone and I was trapped, waiting for the bartender to bring back my credit card,” Darcy mumbles defensively. She can feel Steve’s eyes on her, and she’s so uncomfortable, she wants to squirm under his scrutiny. She can’t explain it, but she doesn’t really want the best guy she’s ever met to know that she’s a magnet for every creep in a 50 mile radius.

“I’m gettin’ an ice pack,” Bucky declares. Darcy sits miserably on the couch, staring down into her black coffee, wondering what Steve is going to say as he moves to sit down across from her on the coffee table. 

“I’m glad Bucky was there to help you out of what sounds like a tight spot,” he says, his voice quiet, and she startles a bit as she feels his hand warm on her knee. She looks up, meeting his eyes.

“Bucky’s the best,” she says, and he smiles at her, a warm, wide smile that dazzles her completely.

“He is,” he says with an emphatic nod. He continues speaking after a small pause. “I know you’re pretty competent with a taser, but if you ever feel like you want to brush up on some self defense tactics, Nat or I can help with that.”

“So I can stop bringing your buddy home with a black eye every time we head out for a drink?” she asks lightly.

“You just strike me as someone who wants to be able to get  _ herself  _ out of sticky situations,” he says. “We can help you with that, is all.”

“Because I’m a troublemaker, like Bucky says?” she can’t help herself from asking. She really hopes he’ll say the wrong thing, that she can storm out of the room, retreat far away from his handsome face and his offers to help empower her to fight her own battles.

“I didn’t hear anything about last night that makes me think you’re the one who was causing trouble. A man doesn’t get a license to harass you because you flirted with him or for any other reason,” he says.  _ Godammit, Steve Rogers. Why are you so perfect? _

***

Darcy Lewis has an energy about her, Steve had decided when he first met her, that just infects everyone around her. The pretty petite brunette had burst onto the scene and quickly integrated herself into their daily lives, somehow seeming to be anywhere and everywhere at once. Bringing coffee to the security team, charming the logistic coordinator into assigning her boss a bigger laboratory, leading efforts to create more social interaction between different teams by organizing pick-up football games and movie nights. She just seems to go out of her way to make others’ day better, whether it was asking Joe in the cafeteria about his daughter’s play or finding a special book that Amelia in accounting had mentioned. It was no wonder that more than half the science interns are in love with her and most of the agents compete for her attention.

She makes time for everyone, has a smile or a kind word for everyone, goes out of her way to make everyone feel special.

Except for Steve Rogers. She just kind of… leaves the room whenever Steve is there. He tries not to take it personally, but the more her friendship with Bucky grows, the harder it is not to feel… left out.

Okay, fine. He’s jealous.

The better friends she is with Bucky, the more Steve wants to know her. And the more she rebuffs any efforts Steve makes to be friendly. Which just makes him try harder... which just makes her avoid him even more.

As he watches her giggling with Bucky on the couch from a safe place in the kitchen, far enough away that he won’t make her jump up and make up an excuse why she suddenly needs to leave, he realizes two things.

One, he’s not jealous that she’s become good friends with Bucky. He’s jealous of  _ Bucky _ , jealous of the way she looks at him and laughs with him and focuses all her charm and energy on him whenever he’s in the room. Steve Rogers has a crush on Darcy Lewis, and she won’t give him the time of day.

The second realization comes a split second later. He can’t be sure, but he’s pretty certain that Darcy Lewis has a crush on Bucky Barnes.

Well isn’t that just perfect, Steve thinks to himself as he quietly leaves the two of them alone.

***

“You avoided my question earlier, I definitely noticed you dodge it,” Bucky says, throwing himself down in the empty chair next to her desk.

“Don’t you have better things to do than interrogate me?” she demands, tapping her pen against her notebook, ignoring him to flip through the large book perched on her desk. “I certainly have better things to do than answer silly questions, my research paper isn’t going to write itself.”

“If you want my help translating those Russian primary sources, you’ll make time,” Bucky says with a cheeky grin. Darcy rolls her eyes, puts down her pen, and gives him her full attention.

“Fine. You’ll have to remind me what question I supposedly dodged,” Darcy says. Jane looks up from her computer as if startled to find her and Bucky there.

“I want to know why you don’t like Steve.”

“I like him just fine.”

At this, Jane stands up and makes her way over to where they are sitting. Bucky glances at her, as if rallying for support.

“You practically run out of the room when he walks in. You acted like he gave you poison instead of coffee this morning. You were all set to come on that hike with Sam and I until I told you Steve was coming too… I don’t get it, what’s your issue with him?”

Darcy struggles to find an answer.

“Nice guys freak her out,” Jane says with a shrug. “Doesn’t know what to do with them, would rather date assholes.”

“I have… kind of a weird history,” Darcy tries to explain, knowing how crazy the whole tale will sound to someone like Bukcy. She decides to keep it short. “It’s just better if I avoid Steve. It’s not personal.”

“He’s taking it pretty personal. Look, he’s my best friend, so if you and I are going to keep hanging out, you need to stop acting like he repels you,” Bucky says, a hard edge to his voice. “I really just want you to stop being such a dick to him.”

“Ouch,” Darcy mumbles. She feels a bit raw on that point, she really wasn’t trying to be a jerk, she just wanted to keep some distance between them. “Okay, understood. I’ll try to be better.”

After Bucky leaves, Jane pats Darcy on the shoulder.

“It’s been a long time now, Darcy. You could give it a chance if you really want,” she says kindly.

“It’s been a long time because the algorithm is working,” she shoots back.

“Darcy, I really have been meaning to tell you something about that,” Jane starts to say, but Darcy keeps going, ignoring her friend and boss.

“Besides, what about Ian? That was only last year. It has not been long enough,” Darcy’s voice has a sharp edge to it, and she feels her hands clenching at her side, the grip of anxiety locking itself around her stomach, which always happens whenever this topic comes up.

“Oh my god, you like him!” Jane declares. Darcy sighs.

“Well, yeah! I mean,  _ obviously _ . Have you read the transcripts of his testimony to Congress on the importance of safeguarding the Constitution to protect our freedoms? Or his speech to the Senate committee trying to convince them to intervene in the Sakovian humanitarian crisis? Or the interview he gave unequivocally in support of trans rights?” she demands excitedly.

“I can’t say that I have,” Jane says with a laugh. “This is reminding me of your Abraham Lincoln phase.”

“I spent  _ months _ reading everything he had ever said and everything ever written about him,  _ of course _ I fell a little bit in love with Abraham Lincoln, okay?” Darcy shoots back defensively. “This is bad, Jane. Really bad. On top of his outstanding political views and passionate defensive of causes I  _ really _ care about, which is  _ outrageously _ sexy to me, he is also insanely attractive - like, seriously hot - and he has this stupid shy grin that he does… I’m in so much trouble. And Bucky is worried I don’t like him.”

“If I understand this correctly, you’re crushing on him the same way you did an unobtainable historical figure,” Jane says and tries to cover her laughter with a cough. “Which means, maybe if you get to know him - like the actual him, not just the guy who makes the sexy speeches - it won’t be so bad. Demystify the unobtainable historical figure, and worse comes to worse, you just kick him to the friend zone.”

“Kick Steve Rogers to the friend zone? Are you insane?” Darcy demands. “He fought the  _ Nazis _ , Jane.”

“So did Bucky, and you aren’t crushing on him,” Jane shoots back, exasperated. She wanders back over to her computer, finished with the conversation.

Darcy fumes for a few minutes, staring at her textbook without any absorbing any of the words.

Finally, she picks up her phone, a decision made.  _ Kick him to the friend zone, Darcy. _

_ Hey Steve, it’s Darcy. If your offer for some self defence training still stands, I’d love to take you up on it. _


	3. Steve Rogers, Thirst Trap

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Somebody get Darcy a glass of water, because Steve Rogers is a giant thirst trap.

Darcy spends the next three weeks getting her ass handed to her by Natasha. She arrives at the gym for her first self defence lesson, strapped into her sports bra and donning her least attractive work-out gear (with the logic that she won’t feel tempted as long as she feels the complete opposite of sexy), only to find that Steve had outsourced her training to someone else.

She feels a mix of relief and disappointment, knowing that she won’t be spending three evenings a week alone with the person she is the most attracted to. And then Natasha begins her lessons, and she spends three nights a week eating the mat without a break for 50 minutes straight, and stumbling around the next day as every single muscle she has aches with every movement.

Darcy finally starts to feel like she’s making progress at the beginning of the tenth session, after she successfully twists free of Natasha’s vise-like grip.

“Oh my god, I did it!” she exclaims proudly, her arms thrown up in the air in triumph. Her two seconds of gloating cost her, as she feels her legs being swept out from under her, and she’s landing soundly on her back with a painful smack, knocking the breath out of her.

As she sucks in a painful breath, trying to fill her lungs again without humiliating herself by issuing a sobbing gasp, a set of hands reach down and help her to her feet.

“She’s caught us all in that trap at some point,” Steve says kindly, his warm, large hand gently rubbing her back as she starts breathing normally. She risks a glance up into his face, feels a jolt in her stomach as his clear blue eyes meet hers, and she shifts away from him abruptly.

“It’s alright, my ass is basically BFFs with the gym floor at this point,” Darcy says flippantly, trying to cover up her retreat from Steve’s proximity by walking over to the bench where she’d left her bottle of water.  _ Friend zone, friend zone, friend zone _ , she chants over and over again in her head. “I’m tracking my progress by how many  _ fewer  _ bruises I acquire per training session.”

“You broke the first rule,” Natasha says casually, her tone a mix of pride and admonishment and Darcy, as always, is amazed that she had just handed Darcy her ass without breaking a sweat. “You lookin’ for me, Cap?”

Darcy feels a thrill in her stomach that she tries to squash quickly when she realizes that Steve is staring at her, and Nat’s question snaps his attention away, like he’s just been caught doing something wrong. She turns away, pretending to fuss with her gear, so she can hide a small secret smile to herself. As much as she would give anything to squash her crush on the Captain, she can’t help - having his attention feels really nice.

“Yeah, sorry to interrupt, but we just got word on the situation in Kiev. Can you make a mission brief in five?” Steve says, his tone suddenly all business.

“I can be there in four,” Natasha answers, suddenly seriously. Darcy has heard about the friendship between these two, how Steve is one of the few people that has won her trust and loyalty but it’s a whole other thing to see it in action. “We’ll have to pick this up some other time, Darcy.”

“My ass is grateful for the reprieve,” Darcy says, waving them off as they both march out of the gym in a rush.

***

Bucky fills in for Natasha the next week, which is a lot of fun but doesn’t really help Darcy’s progress. They spend the three sessions mostly giggling while Bucky tries to show her a few defense moves, but she easily bests him on the attack.

“You’re pulling your punches,” Darcy complains after she dodged a blow and swept his feet out from under him. Bucky jumps to his feet in one swift move and looks at her as if she’s crazy. “If you make this too easy for me, it won’t work.”

“Not much I can do about that, Darce. This is just meant to be teachin’ you a few moves, keep you in good form until Nat is back. I don’t want to hurt you,” he shrugs but with a pointed look in her direction.  _ Right. Super soldier. _

“That doesn’t seem to be something Nat is really concerned about,” Darcy mutters.

“Trust me, doll, you’d know the difference if she was,” Bucky says. “Steve asked her to help you out because she’s got much better control over her own strength.”

“Is that your way of saying if you don’t pull your punches, the punches go through me?” Darcy asks, nudging him with her elbow. Bucky moves, so fast she barely notices it happening until it is too late. The next thing she knows, he’s got her arms locked behind her with one hand, his metal arm gripped around her waist and she’s completely immobilized.

“Bucky!” she shrieks, trying to wriggle free, an utterly futile move. The grip on her wrists is just on the wrong side of painful, his metal fingers digging into her hip. It all happened so fast, her body is responding with panic as she fights against his hold.

“Break the hold,” he commands, his voice deep and gruff. She forces herself to stop moving, to  _ think _ through the training Natasha had drilled into her head. “Break it!”

“I can’t, I can’t do it, let go,” she gasps in pain as his hold tightens. She cries out again, and the second she feels him loosen his grip, she kicks down hard on his instep with both feet and then launches them forward, twisting out of his hands as she tumbles to the ground.

Bucky regains his footing easily while Darcy is splayed out on the ground. She throws her hands out to catch her fall and can feel where the friction of the mat has burned her palms stinging as she pushes herself up into a sitting position.

“Still want me to stop pulling my punches?” Bucky asks. He crouches down beside her.

“That was a bit intense, Buck,” she says and hates how shaky her voice sounds.

“You  _ did _ break the hold,” a voice says from the corner of the room. Darcy’s head shoots up to see who it is, and she is mortified to see Steve standing there, an apparent spectator to her pathetic display of ineptitude.

“Enough to fall flat on my face,” she shrugs as nonchalantly as she can, but she can feel her cheeks burning. Bucky helps her to her feet, and she presses her stinging palms against her legs to keep from wincing.

“Against someone like Bucky? That’s a pretty good outcome,” Steve says warmly, and Darcy feels her heartbeat quicken. He sounds impressed.

“Not bad, Darce. Not bad at all,” Bucky says, throwing his arm around her. “Ready to call it a night? Got a beer with your name on it in the fridge up in the common room.”

“Yeah that sounds pretty good right now,” Darcy replies gratefully, and they head towards the door.

“Steve, you comin’?” Bucky calls. Steve hasn’t moved from where he was watching her training session. There’s a tightness to his facial expression that Darcy can’t quite read, and she pauses, perplexed.

“Come join us,” she says with a soft smile, remembering with a stab of guilt how Bucky had told her she often was a dick to Steve.

“You guys go ahead, I’m going to put in some time with the bag,” he says with a tight smile, gesturing towards the boxing gear in the far corner. Darcy feels a mix of relief and disappointment, and she waves goodnight as Bucky leads her out.

***

Darcy bounces into the gym three nights later. The regular physical activity, even if she’s spending most of her time falling down, has given her an extra dose of energy and she’s in high spirits, ready to have a blast with her buddy.

She tosses her bag down on the bench and is deciding if she wants to start stretching or wait for Bucky to show when her cell phone starts to ring. Darcy fishes it out of her bag, and after seeing the name flashing on the caller ID, she quickly ignores the call.

A beat passes, and it immediately starts ringing again. She hits decline again, and holds her breath. It rings again. She declines the call again, sees a number of unread text messages waiting for her, and silences her phone and shoves it deep into her bag, where she hopes she won’t be able to hear it vibrating. Her heartbeat is racing, and she takes a deep breath to steady herself.

And realizes she has an audience.

Steve is standing in the far corner by the row of punching bags they’d set up for him, his hands wrapped up and poised for the next blow. He’s paused, frozen mid-action, a sheen of sweat shining on his skin in the half-lit gym.

Of course, he’s shirtless, because that’s the kind of luck she’s having today, as her eyes slip, of their own accord, over his chest and torso, drinking in the sight of his perfect male body. It’s hard to look away.

Of course, he’s boxing alone, in the dark, shirtless, because Steve Rogers is a total thirst trap and she’s in hell. How can someone be so beautiful?

She forces herself to stop staring, and tries to quell the instinct she has to just turn and run, remembering her promise to Bucky to be nicer to Steve.

“Hey, didn’t see you there,” she calls with a wave. Steve nods, brushing sweaty hair from his face, and turns to pick up his shirt up off the floor.

“Just blowin’ off a bit of steam,” he says, pulling his white t-shirt on and grabbing a bottle of water. “I don’t think Bucky is back yet, if you’re here to meet him.”

“Yeah, I heard he and some of the others were sent out, but figured I’d come down just in case. You know, keep the discipline and all that,” she says with a nervous giggle. “I’ll see him tonight anyway, we always head to Dooley’s in town most Friday nights.”

Steve smiles, a distracted half smile, and she can tell something is on his mind as he starts to unwrap the tape from his hands. And she thinks of all the kind smiles he’s thrown her way, and she can’t stop herself.  _ Friend zone _ , she thinks.  _ This is in-bounds, friends ask each other what’s up if something seems wrong. _

“Hey Steve, everything alright?” she asks, walking towards him and leaning against the wall.

He glances up at her, still unwinding the tape from his hands, a surprised look that cuts to her heart as he clearly didn’t expect this type of expression of concern from her. God, she’s been such a dick to him.

“Nat’s mission went sideways, got pretty rough. Had to send Bucky and Sam out to help extract her, and everything went a bit south,” he says. “She got out on her own, missed the rendezvous and made it back by herself. She’s up in medical now,”

“Is Natasha okay?” Darcy asks softly.

“Yeah, I think so,” he says quickly, noting her concern. “I should have gone with her.”

“Weren’t you in Haiti  _ and _ Nairobi this week?” she asks, gently. “Last time I checked, being in three places at once isn’t one of your super powers.”

“I made the call, I feel responsible,” he says. He sighs, the deep sigh of a man with a heavy burden on his shoulders. “Bucky is going to be riled up when he gets in.”

“Leave Bucky to me, I’ll let him pick a fight defending my honour if we go out tonight,” she says with a playful smile. “Everyone has their different ways of blowing off steam, his is judging the guys I choose to flirt with and letting him act like a big dumb hero at some point.”

She glances around her.

“And yours seems to be demolishing training equipment alone in the dark,” she says. “Why don’t come out with us some time?”

Steve smiles at her and she feels her insides grow warm and melty as those blue eyes meet hers with a penetrating glance she feels all the way down to her stomach. 

“Maybe I will,” he says. “Sometime.”

***

_ All dressed up with nowhere to go. _ Jane offered to go for a drink with her, in place of her usual outing with Bucky, but their agreed time had come and gone and Darcy was beginning to suspect the scientist had lost track of time. Darcy decides to finish the glass of wine she’s been nursing while scrolling through Instagram before heading over the science building across the compound to find her friend and boss and remind her of her commitment. She put on a cute black sweater dress and full face of makeup, Darcy wasn’t going to let it go to waste.

She hears a commotion in the hallway and a familiar gruff voice barking orders at FRIDAY, and she smiles, jumping up from her chair.

“Hey Bucky! I was starting to think you weren’t getting in tonight after all,” she calls out happily, spotting him marching down the corridor. But her greeting goes unanswered, and she understands something is wrong. He’s still in his suit, marching towards her in that scarily intense way that he has when he’s mission-focused. He doesn’t even look her way, barreling past her.

Curious and a little freaked out, she follows behind him and watches as he bursts through the doors at the end of the hallway. And she pauses at the threshold as understanding washes over her.

Bucky marches straight over to Natasha, who is staring out the window. He’s grabbing her face, cupping it in his hands, guiding her closer to him. He leans forward, pressing his forehead against hers for a long moment, his hands sliding through hair.

“You missed the rendezvous,” he says gruffly. She nods, slowly.

“Had no choice,” she answers simply.

“Hurt?” he mutters, his hand sliding under her jaw and holding her face still as he stares into her eyes, as if daring her to lie to him. “Natalia.”

“Nothing worth writing home about. I’ll have another scar to match the one you gave me back in Iran,” she answers roughly, pulling away.

“Hostages?” he asks as she turns to the window. 

“Lost two. Got the kids out though,” she answers. 

“We got there late. Nothing you could have done,” Bucky says.

Darcy’s heart is in her throat and she’s terrified to move, lest she interrupt what is clearly a very private and deeply intimate moment.

She feels a presence behind her and she looks up over her shoulder. Steve, standing at her back. He gestures with his head, and she follows his signal, backing away as she watches Bucky pull Natasha close to him, wrapping his arms tightly around her.

***

Steve is watching Darcy out of the corner of his eyes as he leads her away. She seems shocked by what she just witnessed, and he feels wretched. He’s long suspected her feelings for Bucky and to be confronted with that scene back there can not have felt good.

“I had no idea,” she says, her voice breathless as he guides her into the common room, sitting her down on the couch. “Bucky and Natasha?”

She’s looking up at him with wide, bright eyes and he worries she’s fighting not to cry.

“It’s… it’s really complicated,” Steve tries to explain.

“He’s been in love with Natasha this whole time, and I had no idea,” she sighs and he reaches out, can’t help resting his hand over hers.

“There’s a long history between them, and a lot of it is pretty messed up,” Steve says quietly. “No one is ever really sure where they stand with each other, least of all them, I think.”

“Unless she gets hurt out on a mission and he’s sent to help but she misses the rendezvous,” Darcy says, meeting Steve’s eyes. Her lips are painted a deep red, and she’s all dressed up, probably waiting to meet Bucky for their weekly night out. He can’t imagine what she’s feeling right now. “No wonder you said Bucky would be really riled up when he got in. He must have been going crazy with worry.”

“I wanted to say something to you, but it wasn’t my place,” he says. She frowns up at him, perplexed.

“Why would you need to tell me? Bucky and I are friends, and I can’t  _ believe  _ I missed what was right under my nose, but really, it’s not any of my business.”

“I just hate to think he’s been leading you on,” he explains. Her eyebrows shoot up, and her whole demeanour has changed.

“Do you think I’m into Bucky?” she exclaims, as if he just told her the moon was made out of cheese.

“You two are inseparable, I mean, I see how you guys are together,” he fumbles.

“Don’t get me wrong, he’s the best, but that is so totally  _ not _ our vibe,” she says. “Were you just worried, right now, that I was like, devastated by this discovery? That my feelings would be hurt?”

“Well, I mean - I just, you know, was worried… about you,” Steve trailed off, feeling like an idiot and cursing his inability to be articulate around pretty girls.

“That’s really nice, Steve. Thank you. But no need to worry, I totally ship it,” she says. “Just… watching them together right now… no man has  _ ever _ looked at me like Bucky was just looking at Natasha. I’m going to be all up in my feelings about  _ that _ for awhile.”

Steve finds he can’t speak, his throat is suddenly very tight and he has to look away from her big beautiful eyes before he acts on impulse and destroys this fragile budding friendship they seem to have.

He realizes he’s still resting his hand on hers as she pulls it away.

“Okay, I definitely need to find Jane now, a large glass of wine is definitely in the cards for tonight,” she says, jumping up. She hesitates, and he knows she’s debating whether to invite him. She always does that now, pauses as if weighing an important question, before she asks Steve to join her. “Want to come out?”

“You go ahead, I’m going to check on Bucky in a bit.”

“Okay, well if you change your mind, we’ll be at Dooley’s,” she says, flashing that dazzling smile at him. He almost changes his mind, but she’s out the door before he has a chance to say anything.


	4. Puppies of Injustice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Puppies! And slippery slopes. And secret cell phone calls, but not the good kind.

“Why are you freaking out?” Jane asks, her calm tone and demeanour a sharp contrast to Darcy, who is pacing around the common room of the science building, glass of wine in hand.

After she’d retreated hastily away from Steve, who was entirely too mesmerizing while he was radiating warmth and care and concern while trying to gently let her know that Bucky was in love with someone else, she’d found Jane, liberated her from the laboratory and, over a very healthy glass of wine, had filled her in on her eventful evening.

“You have pushed me down a slippery slope!” Darcy cries, gesturing wildly. She’s full of nervous energy, giddy and feeling exactly how she did when she was twelve years old and had just had a close encounter with the hottest guy in school. “Oh,  _ ‘just kick him to the Friend Zone’  _ you said. Do you have any idea how hard it is to  _ friend zone  _ the perfect man?”

“He’s not perfect, you’re just all caught up with the whole  _ idea _ of him,” Jane says patiently, sipping her beer.

“He thought I was in love with Bucky! This whole time! And he was  _ worried  _ as he tried to straight up tell me that I don’t stand a chance with him.”

“Who don’t you stand a chance with?” Bucky asks as he saunters into the room, now dressed in sweats and clearly freshly showered, his damp hair tied back. He grabs a beer from the fridge and slumps down onto the couch with a relaxed sigh before turning to Darcy. “Hey, sorry about earlier, I had to take care of something.”

“Or  _ someone _ ,” Darcy says with a mischievous smile. Bucky pauses, staring at her with a perplexed frown. “Don’t worry, I’ll interrogate you about that hickey on your neck a bit later, once we’re finished dealing with my drama.”

“It’s only drama because you  _ make _ it drama. Just  _ give in  _ to temptation, you’re not going to bring about the end of the world by acting on your crush,” Jane burst out.

“Darcy’s got a crush? Tell me it is  _ not _ that guy from the bar last week,” Bucky says. “What’s the deal with you and constantly dating assholes?”

“It’s how she balances her love of dating with the fact that she is  _ convinced  _ that if she dates a nice guy, they’ll turn into a super villain,” Jane interjects before Darcy can silence her. 

“Hey, we proved it was true  _ with science _ !” Darcy exclaims.

“What the hell?” Bucky asks, looking at Darcy like she’s lost her mind. “Is this some messed up girl shit where you make up a wild excuse about why you keep dating losers so you don’t have to admit it’s low self esteem?”

“Oh my god, I wish I were that basic,” Darcy sighs. She’s definitely drunk at this point, regretting pouring her third glass of wine, her head (and her judgement) clouded. “Also, have you met me? I suffer from too much self esteem, if anything.”

“Then what are you goin’ on about?” he asks, perplexed. Darcy leans over, assessing her friend carefully.

“Are you sure you want to be let in the inner circle?” she asks, her tone very serious. “Once you’re in the circle, you can’t un-know what I’m going to tell, you can’t tell anyone and you can’t tell me you think I’m being stupid.”

“That last one, I might have a problem with, but sure,” Bucky says, carefully swooping in and taking Darcy’s glass of wine out of her hands and setting it across the table, out of her reach. She frowns at him, and then shrugs in acquiescence.

“Every single nice guy I have ever dated has turned into, over the course of our time together, a pseudo villain. Like, actual “bad guy who does bad things” villain. Perfectly nice, upstanding citizen before we go out, psychotic murderer by the end,” she says.

Bucky is staring at her with a puzzled expression, clearly thinking she is crazy.

“I’ll ask FRIDAY to send you my SHIELD file if you won’t believe it - it’s all in there - but the Readers’ Digest version of my dating history includes: an arsonist; a shoplifter; a rage maniac with anger issues; a guy who bullied the disabled kid; a drug dealer who stole my car and owned a lot of guns; a potential serial killer liked to murder the pets in the neighbourhood; and, an  _ actual  _ serial killer,” Darcy lists off without taking a breath.

A beat of silence follows before Bucky speaks.

“That’s a real list?” he asks Jane.

“Those are just the nice-guys-turned-villains. It’s a shame this doesn’t work the other way, the assholes she dates now just stay assholes and treat her terribly and cheat on her,” Jane says wryly.

“Not helpful, Jane.” 

“Hey, listen, I’m Team Darcy in all of this. I’m even more sick of seeing you date assholes than Bucky is,” Jane shrugs. 

“You really believe that if you date a good guy, he’ll transform into some kind of super villain?” Bucky asks, leaning forward.

“That is what I’m saying,” she answers, snatching her wine glass from the other side of the table.

“Has it ever occurred to you that they were always who they are? That they were skilled at hiding it from you?” he asks with a pointed look.

“The serial killer murdered five women during the time we dated,” Darcy says quietly. “How could I have not known?”

A long moment of silence passes as Darcy stares down into her wine glass, tracing the curve of the rim with her finger, and the others don’t know what to say.

“Anyway, not the point of this conversation. With Janey’s help, I’ve been able to avoid the good guys and focus on the ‘assholes’ as you call it, and nothing bad has happened since.”

“And then our lives crash landed into an upstate facility crammed full with extremely attractive people, who all kind of have one thing in common - they’re the good guys,” Jane explains, shaking her head. “Her entire dating pool consists of exactly the kind of man she feels like she needs to avoid in order to, like, not cause an apocalypse or something. Her brain is short circuiting. Hence all the jerks she picks up at the Dooley’s.”

“You do realize that most of us are jerks?” Bucky asks with a slow smile.

“Your collective actions would indicate otherwise,” she grumbles. “Anyway, how did we even get on this sad topic? Right! You wanted to know what all the drama was about.”

“What is that buzzing?” Bucky asks, frowning, with a searching look as he scanned the room.

“Oh my god, how can you hear that? My phone is on silent and buried at the bottom of my bag!” Darcy exclaims. Bucky shoots her a withering look as if to remind her of his enhanced abilities. “Oh right, super soldier.”

“Someone is pretty keen to get a hold of you, it’s been going off since I walked in,” Bucky says. “You gonna answer that?”

“Nope,” Darcy says, avoiding the sharp look Jane shoots her. 

“Funny, I thought you changed your number last week and only me and your mom have it,” Jane says, her words clipped. 

“I’m forwarding calls from my old number,” Darcy lies, unable to meet her friend’s eyes, but not wanting to get into it in front of Bucky. 

“Why did you change your number?” Bucky asks, suddenly on alert, his instincts for detecting trouble suddenly activated. 

“Telemarketers, you know,” Darcy shrugs, her voice too tight, unnaturally high.

“Darcy…”Jane intones, her drink set aside, her demeanour entirely serious now. “You let him into the inner circle. Why not on this, too? ”

“It’s  _ nothing _ . I don’t feel like answering my phone right now, alright?” she snaps, jumping up. She snatches up her bag and stalks out of the room. Jane and Bucky can hear her in the kitchen, rinsing out her wine glass, and her steps as she walks down the hallway, leaving them alone.

“Is that something I need to keep an eye on?” Bucky asks, an intense frown on his face. Jane sighs heavily, flopping back into the soft cushions of the sofa. 

“I honestly don’t know. She doesn’t usually hide anything… from  _ anyone _ , let alone  _ me _ . She’s an open book with absolutely no filter,” she responds. “Which is what makes her simultaneously irritating and endearing.”

“Do you want me to try to get it out of her? She’s had, what, three glasses of wine? Piece of cake,” he shrugs.

“We don’t need to  _ shake her down  _ for information and try to infiltrate her secrets while she’s under the influence,  _ god  _ you are such a covert operative,” Jane scoffs. “Let me deal with it. I was giving her a hard time about… well, about a little crush she has right now. Between that and this other thing, I think I pushed too hard and she’s feeling a bit defensive. I’ll talk to her tomorrow - she’s spending the day with her nephew.”

“Okay, we’ll do it your way… for now.”

* * *

There was nothing in the world that could improve Darcy’s disposition more than the tight, sweaty and slightly sticky grasp of her five year old nephew’s hand in hers as he pulled her across the grounds of the Avengers compound, urging her along impatiently.

Her sister had dropped Jamie off in a rush, already running late for the spa appointment made possible by Darcy’s offer to hang with her favourite person in the world, practically throwing his knapsack at her with an air kiss as she dashed back to the car, shout-demanding a promise from Darcy that she not feed him too much sugar while he was there. Darcy’s head, which has been throbbing with the remnants of a hangover, had instantly improved when Jamie had glanced up at her, with his signature cheeky grin, made all the more potent by the giant gap where his two front teeth had previously been.

“So, are you ready to see some puppies?” Darcy had asked him, eliciting a squeal of excitement that resulted in the forced impatient march towards the open field on the south end of the compound where the local animal shelter had set up their adoption drive.

“Remember, buddy, we’re just visiting with the puppies. We can’t bring any of them home,” she says.

Jamie just shrugs and continues to pull her along.

“I can still play with them. And if I see any I really love, I’ll ask Mommy when she gets back from her massage,” he says, with an impish grin. 

“Great strategy, buddy,” Darcy laughs, knowing as well as Jamie does that her sister, a busy working mother with a high stress job, would be highly suggestible after a rare afternoon spent relaxing. “Okay, here we are. Where do you want to start? Dogs or cats?”

“Doggies!” Jamie cries, as if offended by the mere idea that he’d want to see the cats. He drags her, giggling with wild abandon, as they approach a large pen with six or seven dogs of various shapes and sizes. She boosts Jamie up so he can see over the low fence, and a large young golden retriever dashes towards his outstretched hands, nudging him, eliciting a squeal of delight. The dog exploded into a full body wag of happiness as Jamie strained against Darcy’s hold to pet it.

“He can go in,” a volunteer tells Darcy, spotting the obvious love connection happening before her eyes. Jamie practically leaps out of her hands, launching himself over the fence, where the dog knocks him down and licks his face.

“Oh buddy, you haven’t been here ten minutes and you’re already muddy!” Darcy groans with a laugh.

“Looking to get a dog?” a voice asks behind her, and Darcy’s stomach flips as she recognizes the familiar baritone. She plasters a smile on her face, turning around.

Steve has two fluffy balls of fur cradled in his arms, two Husky puppies that appear completely relaxed and content to hang out exactly where they are. The injustice of being greeted by the sight of a man she’s intensely attracted to holding puppies (not just one, but  _ two) _ makes Darcy pause. She needs a second to shake it off.

“Looks like you’re already set,” Darcy says with a wide smile, reaching out to stroke the soft fur of one of the puppies, which rewards her with a nuzzle in her palm and her heart softens.

“I’m just, uh, holding them for someone while they fill out their paperwork,” Steve says, with a sheepish grin.

“By the looks of it, they really had to twist your arm,” she responds. The other puppy, jealous that his brother is getting attention, shifts to sniff her fingers and she scratches behind its ear. “If my nephew has his way, he’ll be taking a dog home with him, and I know my sister and her wife are going to hold me personally responsible.”

“Pets are great for teaching responsibility.”

His face is serious and sincere as he says it, but the sight of him struggling to hold on to two wriggling fluff balls is almost too much for Darcy. Her guard drops slightly, and she finds herself sliding into her usual pattern of behaviour in these types of situations - flirting.

“Don’t worry, Mr Adopt-Don’t-Shop Ambassador, I’m on Team Puppy. Between me and Jamie, I’m sure we can convince his moms,” Darcy laughs. “Although it’s a bit unfair you guys are hosting the adoption drive here. It’s a bit… hard to resist.. with so much cuteness around.”

The pause is deliberate, and she can tell by the minor quirk of his eyebrow that he may have caught her double meaning.

A shriek from the pen interrupts whatever would have come next. Jamie is standing in the centre, holding his right hand, his face red and tears streaming down his face.

“Oh shit.”

She’s on the other side of the fence in a flash, the hot guy she was flirting with entirely forgotten, gathering Jamie into her arms and rushing him out while he is screaming that the dog bit him.

“He was throwing the ball and the dog got impatient, grabbed it from him. I think his hand got in the way,” one of the volunteers says, rushing to the scene. “We’ve got some band aids in the volunteer’s tent, I’ll be right back.”

“Oh buddy, let me see,” she says, managing to keep her voice calm while her blood is pounding with adrenaline. He holds out his hand and Darcy can see a large scratch, but it doesn’t look very deep. “We’ll fix this right up. But let’s a take a deep breath together first, okay?”

Jamie nods and he imitates his aunt as she takes a big, exaggerated breath, and slowly breaths it out. A few more times and his sobs have subsided and he is much calmer.

“Here buddy, how about we clean that up?” Steve asks, suddenly appearing beside them, a small first aid kit in hand.

“Can I have a band aid?” Jamie asks, his voice unusually quiet. Darcy is thankful that he’s still at an age when bandaids can make things better.

“Sure, you can even pick which one you want,” Steve says. He’s got an antiseptic wipe ready and Darcy braces for the inevitable sting, knowing from past experience that Jamie is going to start freaking out again. “Why don’t we ask your aunt to show you the selection while I clean that cut up for you?”

“Oh my goodness, will you look at that? Every single one of the Avengers!” Darcy exclaims in exaggerated excitement as she opens the box of branded kids band aids. She shoots Steve a quizzical look, and he just shrugs and carries on with what he’s doing. “So what do you think? Are you feeling like… the Hulk? Oh, how about Spiderman? My friend Janey, if she were here, would vote for Thor.”

“And who would you vote for?” Steve asks, with a sidelong glance and a half smile that makes her insides melt.

“Jamie knows the answer to that,” Darcy smiles. “Who’s my favourite?”

  
“Captain Marvel!” Jamie declares proudly. He’s still poking through the options in Darcy’s hand, completely oblivious to the fact that Steve has cleaned his wound, entirely distracted.

“What? I love her BFF road-trip-buddy vibe with Fury,” Darcy mutters defensively when Steve shoots her a look. “Okay, time’s up. What’s it going to be?”

“I want… Captain America,” Jamie says.

“Excellent choice!” Darcy barks out with a laugh, avoiding meeting Steve’s eye. She quickly unwraps it, bandaging Jamie’s cut. “Okay, we are all fixed now!”

“Ready to play with more animals?” Steve asks, packing up the supplies. Jamie looks up at him skeptically, his eyes flicking down to his hand.

“Are you maybe a bit afraid of the big dogs now?” Darcy asks her nephew quietly. He nods. “That’s okay. That dog didn’t mean to bite you, he’s just a lot bigger and he’s probably not used to playing with little boys and their little hands.”

“But I still like dogs,” Jamie says with a frown.

“Of course you do! We can hang out with some that are a bit more chill,” Darcy says, nonchalantly. 

“Okay. But then I maybe want to go back to visit Rex and maybe try throwing the ball for him again,” Jamie says.

“Sounds like a plan! Can you say thank you to Steve for helping you?” she says. Jaime opens his mouth, but then suddenly his eyes go as wide as saucers. He tugs on Darcy’s hand urgently, pulling her down. Steve watches in amusement as he whispers in Darcy’s ear.

“I know that’s him,” she answers with a laugh.

“You  _ know _ him?” Jamie whispers, incredulously.

“I do. And now you do, too,” she says.

“You’re  _ friends  _ with Captain America?” he whispers, incredulously.

“Well, I might not be for long if you don’t remember your manners and thank him for helping you,” Darcy reminds her nephew.

“Thank you for helping me,” Jamie says in a rush. “Are you really friends with my aunt?”

“You’re welcome, I’m glad to help,” Steve answers, clearly very amused. “And yes, I’m friends with your Aunt Darcy.

“ _ Awesome...  _ Can you tell my mom she has to let me get a dog? She  _ has _ to listen to you,” Jamie asks excitedly, spotting a golden opportunity.

_ Day saved _ , Darcy thinks as she and Steve choke back laughter as they head back towards the dog pen.


End file.
